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Season 29 review

Written by HF2004

Season 29 just finished and so we’re here with the season review. Many will say it was an interesting season and so just like last season I’ll write this article so you can read all about it:

The Kampuchea Cup:
As usual 128 teams started of in this cup in week 1, the Premier League teams all started off against a bot team but the further we got, the more interesting the cup became.

Round 2 already saw a first Premier League team’s exit as AlterTeam Romania lost on penalties against FCVB2 but it was round 3 that was really devistating for the Premier League teams: Bowrain Batta got kicked out after a 3-2 loss against ssc -273.15, DLM Cambodia (last season’s cup winners) lost after extra time 2-1 against Cambodian Checkers and BH-Kaay went out 3-1 against Bayer 04 Cambodia leaving us with only 4 Premier League teams in round 4.

However these were the 4 teams that would go all the way to the semi-finals. The semi-finals showed surprising results. In the first semi final Mondulkirin Kiri managed to beat the big favourite Rangoon Dragons (who gave priority to the hattrick masters) 2-1 with a bit of help from the match engine. In the other semi final again the match engine helped the weaker team and so Chez Caro & Fred won 2-1 against the Tulcea Lions to have a final between Mondulkirin Kiri and Chez Caro & Fred. For both of these teams it was their first final!

A tight final was to be expected but behind the scenes something had happened during the semis. While Mondulkirin Kiri had to use teamspirit to get the ticket for the final Chez Caro & Fred had a picdeal with Tulcea Lions to improve the chances of whoever won that semifinal in the final. With this advantage Chez Caro & Fred managed to take the midfield in the final and win the cup 4-2. The first big trophy for the team!

The other cups:
Let's start with the emerald challenger cup: As usual only 2 teams that went out of the main cup went to the semifinals, these were ~*DEVARAJA IRRAWADDY*~ and Bradipa F.C.! Devaraja Irrawaddy even made it to the final beating Rangoon Dragons (who we know isn’t interested in sidecups) to face Tulcea Lions who kicked out Bradipa F.C. In the final the Premier League team dominated the game and so Tulcea Lions lifted the Emerald challenger cup for the 2nd time!

In the Ruby challenger cup we already had a Premier League team playing in the 1st round. However AlterTeam Romania wouldn’t make the quarter finals (the moment were the loosers from the main cup round 5 entered the competition). In the last round before this they were kicked out by Colosso Romano. This ment that not a single Premier League team was in the quarter finals and so for sure a lower league team would win this cup. From the 4 teams that were in the cup since round 1 (Colosso Romano, FC Cambodia09, Cambodian~Dragons FC and Corrupt Kickers Cambodia) only Corrupt Kickers Cambodia went through to the semis beating sk slavia kampot. The other 3 semi finalists were somnang stars, FBWC Football Club and Wall.E Tigers. In the semifinals Corrupt Kickers Cambodia beated somnang stars after a real thriller (6-5 after extra time) and Wall.E Tigers won against FBWC Football Club (5-3 also after extra time). A very even final was also decided in extra time. Eventhough Wall.E Tigers managed to take the lead after 93 minutes it was Corrupt Kickers Cambodia who still scored twice to lift the cup.

The Sapphire challenger cup had no less than 3 Premier League teams in round 1 but one of them (Bowrain Batta) didn’t make round 2. In round 2 BH-Kaay went out of the cup against Cambodian Checkers to leave only 1 Premier League team in round 3 (DLM Cambodia). Although DLM Cambodia made it all the way to the final it wasn’t them who could win this cup. In the final Nac Mac Feegles Against Ya Wee Dafties prooved just to strong beating DLM Cambodia and lifting their first trophy of the season.

Finaly we have the Kampuchea Consolation Cup, the cup where teams who go out in the first round of the Emerald and Ruby challenger cups have their own cup. Both finalists (Kaoh Kong Pirates and Cambodian Spartans) came from the Ruby challenger cup. In the final Kaoh Kong Pirates dominated the game and so it was only logical they won the cup.

The Premier League:
Where to start to explain what happened this season in the Premier League? Well, we’ll start with the story of Bowrain Batta: after a great start (a draw at Chez Caro & Fred and a win against Rangoon Dragons) their manager decided it was time to rebuild the team resulting in loosing all other games and finishing 8th. Tulcea Lions knew this was their last season (due to supporter running out) and therefor the Premier League wasn’t the priority this season, to say more the second half of the season was about achievement collecting for the Lions. Chez Caro & Fred had a horrible start of the season with only 4 points out of 10 games! This followed by 7/9 in the next 3 games saw both these teams at 11 points before the final day. Although Tulcea Lions did their best managing a draw against Rangoon Dragons it was Chez Caro & Fred (who had an easy game against Bowrain Batta) who finished 6th.
At the top of the league Rangoon Dragons had lost a bit of their superiority. They still won the league but with only 32 points (which was 10 less than last season). Newcomer Mondulkirin Kiri had a great season and finished 2nd! The other 3 teams (AlterTeam Romania, BH-Kaay and DLM Cambodia) could all still finish 3rd to 5th after 13 games. BH-Kaay had to play against DLM Cambodia and whoever would loose that game would finish 5th, in case of a draw and a big loss from AlterTeam Romania against Mondulkirin Kiri even AlterTeam Romania could finish 5th. AlterTeam Romania however won their game to secure the 3rd place and in the other game it was BH-Kaay who took the win to secure the 4th place and so DLM Cambodia would finish 5th.

Division II:
The top in Division II was completely decided before the last day, all champions were known. The only thing that was left on the last day was to see who would take direct promotion. In the end the direct promotion came for Nac Mac Feegles against Ya Wee Dafties (II.1) and sk slavia kampot (II.4). Siam Pirates (II.2) and ssc -273.15 (II.3) were the other champions.

Division III:
Division III has become a league with overall 50% of botteams so the most excitement we see here is who will become champions, in most of the 16 leagues we saw a champion who was just alot better than the rest but there were some exceptions: In III.2 the title would be decided on the last day: Pailin Boys were in the best position but loosing the last game could give a chance to Bichos colorados de Kampuchea. However Pailin Boys won their game to take the title. In III.4 Colosso Romano and Greenest Dragons were tied with a slight advantage on goal difference for Colosso Romano. They’d face each other in the last game to decide who’d take the title. Greenest Dragons took the lead but in the 75th minute Colosso Romano managed the equalizer who gave them the title. In III.12 FIF Batdambang and Koh Rong Pirates were tied and would have to face each other on the last day to decide the champion. FIF Batdambang won 0-4 to crown themselfs champions. In III.13 Phanterize was in the lead but their opponent for the last day KampotLions was only 1 point behind. Phanterize crushed the Lions 0-8 on the last day to take the title.

The champions of division III are: ~*DEVARAJA IRRAWADDY*~, Pailin Boys, Kaoh Kong Pirates, Colosso Romano, Cambodian~Dragons, Takeo Tigers, FC Quintien reservas, FC Bayern Riem II, Prey Veng Snakes, TheGuardian, Potatoe Jack Cambodia, FIF Batdambang, Phanterize, Palmbeach, Sons of Legends and FC Cambodia09 (the underlined teams took automatic promotion, the others would play a promotion battle).

The promotion/relegation battles:
In hattrick half of the champions of the lower leagues have to play numbers 5 and 6 of the league above in a promotion/relegation battle to decide who will play where the next season. These battles took place 1 week after the final game day. The team from the higher division always has the home advantage in these battles.

For the 2 remaining places in the Premier League we had thus the following 2 battles: DLM Cambodia (5th) vs ssc -273.15 (champion II.3) and Chez Caro & Fred (6th) vs Siam Pirates (champion II.2). Both Premier League teams managed to avoid relegation winning their games.

In the 8 battles between divisions II and III we saw 5 times the hometeam win, only 3 champions from division III managed to take promotion through a promotion battle: Sons of Legends won against a bottified Corrupt Kickers Cambodia (5th in II.1), FC Cambodia09 won from 1860 Wacker (6th in II.1) and Kaoh Kong Pirates beated Zeitgeist (6th in II.3)

The UCCC Belt:
The UCCC (Unofficial Clubteams Cambodian Championship) Belt is an unofficial title for the best team in Cambodia, to win this title you have to beat in an official match (main cup or league) within 90 minutes the current holder. This season the belt has travelled quite a bit. Rangoon Dragons lost the belt to Bowrain Batta on day 2 in the premier league who then gave it to ssc -273.15 in the cup round 3, in the 4th round of the cup the Rangoon Dragons took it back from ssc -273.15 to loose it again to Mondulkirin Kiri in the cup semifinal. In the cupfinal Mondulkirin Kiri lost the belt to Chez Caro & Fred who gave the belt back to Rangoon Dragons on day 7 of the Premier League. On day 9 the belt went to DLM Cambodia who passed it to Mondulkirin Kiri on day 11. On day 12 BH-Kaay took the belt to give it to Chez Caro & Fred on day 13. After that Chez Caro & Fred managed to hold on to the belt for the rest of the season!

The Hattrick Masters:
The Hattrick Masters is the toughest competition in hattrick and only the champions and national cup winners from each country get a ticket to participate in it. For Cambodia this season the participants were: Rangoon Dragons (last season's champion) and DLM Cambodia (last season's cup winner)

For DLM Cambodia it was a short story, they went out in round 1 against Moldovan Cup winner CSCT Buiucani.

Rangoon Dragons however had a remarkable run: they were free in round 1 but then won against Slovakia's champion sk rk in round 2. In round 3 Benin's champions and cup winners Howles Bowles were set aside. In round 4 Rangoon Dragons defeated Argentina's Cup winners R.C.D Tanque to face Swedish Cup winners Prinskorv FC in round 5. Although Rangoon Dragons put up a good fight the Swedish team kicked our champion out and then even went all the way to win the masters. A wonderfull run anyhow from the Rangoon Dragons!

That’s it for my season 29 review, I hope you liked it and will be looking forward to next season’s review ;)